Ben Youdan: Action for Smokefree Director on crack down on disposable vapes starts today

Smokefree advocates are hoping a new vaping crackdown coming in today doesn't deter smokers trying to quit.

The new rules include stricter advertising restrictions for vape retailers and a ban on disposable vapes.

It's an effort to clamp down on youth vaping, with around 10% of teenagers currently regular vapers.

Action for Smokefree Director Ben Youdan told Ryan Bridge it's about striking the right balance.

He says just leaving products cheaper than smoking but not too cheap for young people, is important.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Smoking, well, not smoking, but vaping. Disposable vapes are out
from today. Advertising rules are being tight and it's all
about an effort to cut the teenage vape rate of
ten percent. Ben Yoden is Action for Smoke Free twenty
twenty five director with us this morning.

Speaker 2 (00:14):
Hey Ben, good morning.

Speaker 1 (00:17):
Good to have you on the show. So we're never
actually going to see vapes. If we go into a
diary from today, we're not actually going to see them anymore,
are we No, Well.

Speaker 2 (00:26):
The rules are changing to get rid of disposable vapes,
as you say, but also to make them less visible retail,
so particularly in the specialist fake retailers that as of
today you're not supposed to be able to see them
from outside the store or even on their websites as well,
So trying to make them much less appealing from outside

(00:49):
the shops.

Speaker 1 (00:49):
Does that actually work because we put cigarettes behind a screen,
remember when we did that? Does that actually stop demand
or is it really just at the end of the
day price that does that?

Speaker 2 (01:01):
Well? I think with cigarettes it's been a combination of
lots and lots of things, including pricing, putting out a display,
and making the packages play with vapes we're looking at
something slightly different because we do want them to be
available for adults who's smoke and they're using them to
stop smoking and have appeal compared to a cigarette. But
what we don't want is for them to be marketed

(01:22):
in a way or sold at a price point that
is appealing to young people and people have never smoked
as well. So it's about trying to get that balance right.

Speaker 1 (01:31):
Do we have it right? Because the thing is, with smoking,
they put the price up every year, what is it,
ten percent? I think they've paused it, but that's what
made people stop smoking. I thought, oh my god, I
literally can't afford their so eithers have to steal them
or not smoke anymore, whereas with vaping they're not moving
the price.

Speaker 2 (01:46):
Right. Well, I think pricing has definitely had a massive
impact with smoking, and actually we're probably the most expensive
country in the world relative to income to buy cigarettes now,
although the city creation at the moment, we still have
smoking very concentrated in our kind of lower income populations
and still much higher rates for Mahdi and Pacific. So

(02:10):
having more affordable, less harmful al turn, it's accessible to
people who are still smoking. I think is still really
really important, but for young people doing things like getting
rid of the disposable baits which are really cheap and
accessible and still have been at kind of pocket when
the price is really five or ten dollars, and just
leaving things that are still cheap than cigarettes, but not

(02:33):
so cheap that they're very easy to buy. I think
it's part of trying to get that balance that we
haven't necessarily had right so far.

Speaker 1 (02:40):
All Right, being appreciate your time being Joden the you
Didn't Rather the action for Smoke for You twenty twenty
five To rictate For more from early edition with Ryan Bridge,
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